Allen Miller - After receiving her Bachelor's in chemistry from Willamette, a Master's in chemistry from the UW, and a Master's education from WWU, his daughter signed her “rookie contract” to teach physics and chemistry at Garfield High School in Seattle.

Eve Chu (our exchange student from Taiwan) - Wants to go to a concert and needs someone to go with her.

Nick Schmidt - Back after being gone most of the month and a great GNAC golf championships where he served as starter at Coeur d’alene

Announcements

President Christy reminded everyone that 5/7/18 meeting is at Indian Summer.

Nate Naismith will be taking headshots for Rotary/Facebook/LinkedIn/etc. for a $10 donation prior to and after the 5/14 and 5/21 meetings

Auctions

Steve Bean auctioned off eggs and two different sets of theatre tickets.

Program: Oscar Soule – Earth Day Awards and Environment Update

Oscar Soule presented environmental awards as follows:

John Calambokidis, Cascadia Research Collective

Loretta Seppanen, South Sound Farm Trust

Oscar then delivered his annual environmental update. While most Americans share a concern for the environment, only about 20% act on that concern all the time. In terms of the public’s top priorities for 2017, the environment fell in the middle of the pack, behind things such as terrorism and the economy, but ahead of immigration and drug addiction.

The public’s priority for protecting the environment has risen 14% since 2009. Environmental protection is a much higher priority among young people (18-29 years old – 64%) than older Americans (over 50 years old - 48%). It will be interesting to see if (1) this concern stays high as this younger group ages, and (2) if those now in high school have an even higher commitment.

Oscar compared the language used most often in the political parties’ platforms to show their relative support for environmental issues. While we are becoming more polarized in our thinking, there are many areas in which liberals and conservatives agree. Hopefully this is where we may be able to dialog to achieve some results.

Oscar touched on some of the major the issues solutions that are on professional environmentalists’ minds.